


keep a close watch

by flowermasters



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Canon-Typical Violence, Developing Relationship, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Post-Avengers: Endgame (Movie), Pre-Relationship, Subtle UST, obligatory mission fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-05
Updated: 2019-05-05
Packaged: 2020-02-26 19:14:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,219
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18723238
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flowermasters/pseuds/flowermasters
Summary: “Don’t go getting maudlin on me,” Sam says, “just because I got my shit rocked.”





	keep a close watch

**Author's Note:**

> Still trying to get out some feelings after Endgame, so I had to write up something for our resident old married couple.

“Don’t need a hospital,” Sam slurs, when Bucky lifts him up from the rubble that once was a concrete wall. “I’m not hurt bad.”

“Not hurt bad?” Bucky says, sliding an arm around Sam’s waist. Sam winces, sucking in air through his teeth. “Pal. You’re definitely going to the hospital now.”

“Not your pal,” Sam grouses, flinging an arm over Bucky’s shoulders, “and no, I’m not.”

Bucky could force him to go; unless Sam decided to pull a gun on him, there’s not too much he could do to resist, not after being punted through a warehouse wall by an enhanced—an enhanced who has now fucked off to God knows where. However, Sam is able to stand under his own power as Bucky goes back to fetch the shield—“come on, man,” he gripes, a lot less playfully rude about it than usual—and he manages to limp back to the car without assistance, though Bucky hovers around him the whole time, more anxious than he’d like to admit.

“We should—,” Bucky begins, once he’s in the driver’s seat of the little black car. Sam usually drives, having had a lot more practice at it in the past few decades, but he’s not complaining now.

“Motel first,” Sam says, leaning his head back against the headrest. He has his goggles on, but Bucky knows what he looks like when his eyes are closed; his eyelashes curl just so. Knows what he looks like when he’s in pain, too. “Let me get this armor off.”

Bucky takes him back to the motel, gnawing his bottom lip the entire fifteen-minute drive across the mid-sized town. Some college town in Florida, or at least it was five years ago. Now its most notable feature is an unidentified enhanced individual with uncontrolled abilities squatting in a warehouse on the outskirts of town. They were trying to make contact, trying to help, but instead Sam is in the passenger seat, possibly—no, probably—bleeding internally. He’s not talking, not even to bitch about something, which is never a good sign.

The motel is deserted save for one car that probably belongs to the bedraggled twenty-something maintaining the joint, so Bucky parks right in front of the room. He’s not sure if this place reopened post-snap or if, as the only operating motel for probably a hundred miles or more, it has somehow clung to life for the past few years. Sam limps to their door and waits, head bowed, while Bucky fumbles in various utility pockets before finally realizing Sam’s had the key the whole time.

“Sorry,” Sam says, as Bucky slips two fingers into a pocket on his right outer thigh to fish for the key. Presumptuous of him, to go for the pocket himself, but Sam doesn’t complain.

 _Don’t apologize_ , Bucky almost says, half-frantic. He catches it at the last second, though, and instead says, “You hit your head or something?”

“Yeah,” Sam says. “With a cinderblock.”

He wears a helmet now, sort of has to since he took the shield, and Bucky surprises himself by humming sympathetically. He gets the door open, and Sam limps into the musty room, leaving Bucky to fetch all their various and sundry weapons from the car.

When Bucky comes in, Sam is struggling to get his gear off; Bucky hums again and moves to help him. Sam hisses like an affronted cat, but Bucky can’t tell if it’s his injuries or the principle of the thing. Once the armor’s been stripped off, Sam eases himself down into a sitting position on the edge of the nearest bed. Bucky’s bed, technically speaking, not that it matters much. They’re both lumpy and smell like mothballs.

He doesn’t move from this position for a few seconds, then lifts his head to look at Bucky. “We still got that Tylenol in the car?” he asks dryly.

“Yeah,” Bucky says. “Could get you a lot stronger than Tylenol. From a doctor.”

“Honestly, I kind of doubt it,” Sam says, and Bucky remembers, oh yeah, everything went to shit during that strange, placid dream he remembers. Hospitals, especially middle-of-nowhere hospitals, are hit or miss, though things are improving as the formerly-deceased flood the job market. “Besides. It’s Tylenol with codeine.”

Bucky fetches the Tylenol from the glovebox, then Sam says, “We got any cold compresses?”

They don’t, so Bucky heads down the street to a dilapidated CVS. While there, he picks them up some frozen dinners, though they’ll have to be eaten immediately as they won’t keep in the tiny fridge in the room. He can’t find any cold compresses—the “pharmacy” aspect of this CVS Pharmacy is woefully bare—so they’ll have to make do with ice. Then, as an afterthought, he picks up candy bars. Stranger things have endured in this world, and Sam likes Almond Joys. Bucky makes sure to smile at the cashier in the hopes that she won’t be alarmed by his split lip, but she just blinks back at him dolefully.

When he makes it back to the room, Sam is lying flat on his back on top of the covers, still wearing his boots and under-armor. Bucky refuses to acknowledge the way the stretch fabric clings, how the splay of Sam’s legs is just unstudied enough to catch attention. “No cold compresses, but I’ll get you some ice,” Bucky says. “Brought dinner.”

Sam cracks open one eye. “Frozen food,” he says, when Bucky holds up the box, the cardboard already turning slightly squishy from being exposed to the Florida heat. “You know how to treat a guy.”

It’s not said with his usual arch attitude, but the fact that he’s making jokes is a positive sign. “Meatloaf and mashed potato. Bon appetit.”

“You eat it,” Sam says. “I’m just resting my eyes.”

Bucky goes outside and down the walkway to a big machine marked _ICE_ in faded red letters. There is, thankfully, ice in the machine, but there was nothing to carry it with in the room, so he has to make two trips, fashioning impromptu ice packs from a worn-out hand towel and a pillow case. When he comes back, Sam doesn’t open his eyes at the close of the door like he did before.

“Sam,” Bucky says, standing by the bed. “Where’s it hurt?”

“Everywhere,” Sam says. “Mostly my ribs.”

When Sam makes no attempt to move, Bucky squats down slightly, unsure what to do. “CVS didn’t have any bandages,” he says. “Guess I could try to wrap you with—a sheet, or something.”

“No,” Sam says, still without opening his eyes. “We don’t wrap ribs anymore, it’s hard on the lungs. Just help me put the ice on, please.”

“Goddamn, a pretty please,” Bucky says, carefully nestling a bundle of ice against Sam’s right side, which he gingerly indicates with a wave of his hand. “Really rattled your brains earlier, huh.”

“Better rattled than scrambled,” Sam says, sounding drowsy. “I don’t think I have a concussion, for the record.”

“Sounds like what somebody with a concussion would say.”

Sam finally cracks open his eyes again, the better to give Bucky a baleful look. “My name is Samuel Thomas Wilson,” he says. “Born on August 13th, 1982—”

He breaks off with a little grimace, then moves his arm to indicate another spot on his right side that needs icing. “No coughing or shortness of breath, so that’s good,” he says after a minute. “Just hurts to talk, is all.”

Something squirms in Bucky’s chest, something small and vulnerable. Tender. He lets that feeling alone and instead says, “Know how hard that must be for you, of all people.”

To his surprise, Sam huffs, amused, then winces. “I’m alright, Barnes,” he says, looking up at Bucky. In the pale dusk-light filtering in through the thin curtains, his eyes look almost black, just a faint hint of their real deep brown. “Just need some rest, is all.”

Bucky eats the meatloaf and mashed potatoes, since Sam seemed so unenthused with it; he has to go down the hall to the office to use a microwave since the one in the room won’t come on. When he returns, he expects Sam to at least be awake enough to watch television, as it’s only about eight o’clock, but instead he’s sound asleep, breathing slow and steady save for the occasional grimace in his sleep. Bucky spends longer than he’d like to admit watching Sam breathe, looking at his face and searching for those little twitches of discomfort.

Sam belongs in the sky; he’s more comfortable there than Bucky could ever imagine being. He’s a good fighter, of course, that goes without saying, but in cramped quarters, with an angry and confused assailant to deal with, and with the shield ripped away—it had been all too easy for him to be flung, ragdoll style, against the nearest wall. The wings had helpfully engaged and taken the brunt of the impact—Bucky can only imagine the tinkering with that they’ll probably need after that—and Sam had been wearing armor, but still. Jesus. This is their life and yet it’s still jarring, somehow, when this kind of thing happens. Sam’s a fighter like Steve, but he’s not the same kind of unbreakable.

As the light from the window fades, Bucky flips on the bathroom light and leaves the door open a bit, then turns the TV on but leaves it muted. This gives the room a sickly glow; fortunately, Bucky has excellent night vision. He takes a shower, the low pressure meaning that it takes longer to get properly clean. At least the water heater manages something better than lukewarm, which is more than most of the showers he’s been in recently.

When he comes out, he shrugs on the last of the decently fresh clothes from his bag, quick and businesslike. They’ll have to find a laundry mat, or else start washing things in the tub. This thought brings back the image, faint and fleeting, of his mother, hanging wet clothes to dry by sunny windows. The memory—barely more than an impression—is interrupted by Sam.

“Barnes?” he says, as Bucky is in the process of buttoning his jeans. “That you?”

Bucky looks at him over his shoulder, shaking away wet hair. He’s been flirting with the idea of cutting it. Hasn’t gotten around to it yet. “Yeah,” he says. “It’s me.”

Sam doesn’t say who else he could’ve thought Bucky might be. He starts to sit up, grimacing, but Bucky moves toward him. “Do you need something?”

Sam has the energy to raise his eyebrows, at least. “Yeah, to take my boots off,” he says. “Think I can manage that.”

Yet he doesn’t argue when Bucky kneels down by the foot of the bed and unties his shoelaces, just shifts his legs gingerly and flexes his feet to help as Bucky carefully tugs his boots off. “Don’t mention this to anyone,” Sam says, “or I’ll cut off that hair of yours in your sleep.”

“You might be doing me a favor,” Bucky says, letting his hands rest lightly on Sam’s ankles, feeling the tendons shift like harp strings as he moves. He hasn’t seen Sam physically vulnerable outside of a fight before. “‘Sides, who am I gonna tell? You’re the only one I talk to all day, Wilson.”

“You should be so lucky,” Sam says, closing his eyes and laying his head back against the flat pillow once more. Bucky thinks of sliding his hands up Sam’s legs. Not like _that_ , just to—soothe. To rub out the tension in his muscles, give him some relief. Maybe something like that, then.

“Yeah, I guess I am.”

“Don’t go getting maudlin on me,” Sam says, “just because I got my shit rocked.”

“Not maudlin,” Bucky says. “I save that for when I drink.”

“Cap couldn’t get drunk,” Sam says dozily. _Couldn’t_ , like Steve’s dead. “Can you?”

“No,” Bucky says, and then Sam doesn’t say anything, having apparently fallen back to sleep.

He stays asleep when Bucky goes to get fresh ice, and also when Bucky, conscious that he must be cold from all the icewater that’s seeped into his shirt, covers him with the quilt and sheet from the other bed. He only tenses up once, when Bucky’s left hand brushes the bare skin of his arm. The thing’s supposed to mimic the warmth of real skin, but after handling ice, it’s cold enough to raise gooseflesh. Bucky hums again, trying to soothe, hopefully succeeding.

Bucky sleeps thinly for a few hours, waking around three to the sound of sheets rustling. “Sam?”

“The Tylenol,” Sam says, voice hoarse the way it gets from sleep. Bucky shifts, somehow feeling both uneasy and very easy all at once. “Where’d we leave the bottle?”

The bottle’s sitting on the tiny table between their beds, but Bucky gets up anyway, fetching a pill and uncapping Sam’s bottle of water for him. Sam takes the pill. His fingers brush Bucky’s as he passes the water bottle back. “Thank you,” he says. Not the brisk _thanks, man_ , he should give, like he’s thanking someone for holding the door for him or something. He lingers on this one.

“Yeah,” Bucky says, his own voice creaky. “You feelin’ alright?”

“Never better, baby,” Sam says, already dozy again.

Bucky fetches fresh ice again, though Sam grumbles in protest at the cold and, in all likelihood, at being babied. _It’s for your own good_ , Bucky thinks of saying. _I want to take good care of you._ Instead he just huffs under his breath, fond, exasperated, rests his hand on Sam’s shoulder for a second in what is supposed to be a brotherly, _quit complaining and let me help you_ sort of gesture. Sam just sighs.

Bucky goes back to bed, sleeps curled up on the mattress, the lack of covers tolerable due to the fact that the air conditioner in the room doesn’t work. He dreams about Sam, but not about Sam getting crushed under rubble like he might have expected; no, he dreams about Sam in the car, Sam leaning back against the headrest, smiling at a joke, Sam’s goddamn eyelashes. He wakes at dawn still thinking of them.

Sam’s already awake and, to Bucky’s surprise, up; he walks slowly out of the bathroom, a joint somewhere creaking audibly. “Don’t look at me like that,” he says. “I’ve had to pee for hours.”

Bucky sits up, resists the urge to wipe at his mouth and eyes and generally make himself look less mussed. Sam’s seen him look a hell of a lot worse. “You still hurting?”

“Hell yeah,” Sam says, making it to the other bed and sitting down on the side nearest Bucky. Bucky does not miss his wince. “Thanks for helping me out last night. I know I was probably a real pain in your ass.”

“No more than usual,” Bucky says, and that thing in his chest stirs again when Sam grins. “That hit was good for something, I guess, ‘cause you’ve been a lot more pleasant than usual.”

“Nah,” Sam says. “I’m always pleasant. Downright sweet, at times. My greatest weakness.”

“Sure,” Bucky says, and Sam laughs, though he subdues it quickly. “That reminds me.”

He gets up and reaches in the set-aside CVS bag, finding candy under the soggy box of a wasted frozen dinner. “Breakfast,” he says, offering the bars to Sam.

Sam eyes Bucky’s hand. “You bought us Almond Joys for breakfast?”

“What?” Bucky says. “You feel like finding a restaurant? Your treat, obviously.”

Sam rolls his eyes. “Obviously,” he says, taking one candy bar, though Bucky had meant for him to have both. “Let me start counting change, then, since you spent all the cash on high fructose corn syrup.”

“No idea what that is, but it sounds disgusting,” Bucky says.

“Oh, it’s very, very good,” Sam says, peeling open the candy bar without a care in the world. Bucky watches as he then eases himself back on the bed to lean against a pillow propped against the headboard. “Something to say, Barnes?”

“No,” Bucky says. “Still wish you’d go to a doctor, though.”

Sam starts to shrug, then seems to think better of it. “Honestly, when I said I wouldn’t go, I might have been _slightly_ delirious,” he admits. “Might have been five years ago, but my brain still thinks like a fugitive.”

“I know the feeling,” Bucky says, sitting back down on his own bed.

“I bet,” Sam says, but his gaze is not at all unkind, which sort of makes Bucky want to get back up again, maybe pace around a little bit. There’s a little pause, and then he asks, “You take care of Steve a lot, when you guys were coming up?”

“I think so, yeah,” Bucky says, because thinking back that far still feels a little like trying to open his eyes and see underwater sometimes. That Steve, small and sickly and scrappy, feels almost as foreign to him as the Steve with silver hair and pictures of smiling strangers tucked into his wallet. Bucky supposes he could call Steve, fill him in on what’s been going on, tell him about what could’ve happened to Sam; he’d want to know. Maybe he will call, but later. “Why?”

“You’re not half-bad at it,” Sam says, grinning a little. “You tutted over me like my own grandma would. Can’t believe you let me sleep on a possible concussion, though.”

Bucky rolls his eyes. “You wouldn’t fuss at your grandmother the way you did at me.”

“Got me there,” Sam says, taking a bite of candy. He meets Bucky’s eyes, and Bucky smiles despite himself. Sam has a knack for that, goddamn him.

After a few minutes of quietude while he eats his candy bar, Sam looks around and says, “Where’d my boots go?”

“Foot of the bed,” Bucky says. “You going somewhere?”

Sam sits up and grimaces. “While your caution is appreciated,” he says, glancing over a little too casually, so that Bucky feels uncomfortably seen, “we’ve got an enhanced giant to find, before he puts the hurt on somebody else.”

“Like hell, Sam,” Bucky says. “You can barely stand up straight. The guy will have found somewhere else to hole up; he’s not going out of his way to hurt people.”

“So what do you suggest we do instead?” Sam says, raising his eyebrows again. “Wait for my boo-boos to heal?”

“Ideally, yeah,” Bucky says. “But since I’m not dumb enough to bank on that, we can at least hang out here for a couple more days. Surely you can stand a few days of being waited on.”

Sam’s eyebrows have lowered back to a normal point on his face, and there’s a little smirk playing about his mouth. Bucky feels like squirming again, even when Sam averts his eyes as he shifts back to lean against the headboard once more. “Waited on, you say. Hand and foot, I assume.”

Bucky rolls his eyes again. “Whatever you want, pal.”

“Thought I said I wasn’t your pal,” Sam says, turning his head to look at Bucky again.

“You’re something, alright,” Bucky says, and even though he doesn’t look up he knows Sam's still watching him, can feel it when Sam smiles.


End file.
